School leaders urge rethink of vetting and barring scheme

In a letter to the Children’s Secretary Ed Balls, union chiefs including John Dunford, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders and Mick Brookes, general secretary of the National Association of Head Teachers, slammed the scheme.

The letter said: "The first duty of our colleagues is to the health, safety and care of the student population. We take that duty extremely seriously, however we believe that the newly introduced system is disproportionate to risk."

The letter claims that the vetting and barring scheme will deter parents from volunteering to help out with school sports, plays, trips and fundraising.

It warns that the new procedures could also make it hard to hire school support staff such as lunchtime supervisors, plumbers and heating engineers.

Other unintended consequences of the scheme could be a loss of foreign exchange trips, a loss of volunteering opportunities for pupils on Duke of Edinburgh programmes and a reduction in community engagement projects.

The letter warns Balls that no vetting scheme is completely reliable. It claims teachers believe the new checks could create "a sense of false security".

It adds that Ian Huntley, the caretaker who murdered Soham schoolgirls Jessica Chapman and Holly Wells, "might well not have been exposed by the Criminal Records Bureau system".

Sir Roger Singleton is reviewing the vetting and barring scheme at the moment, but the letter claims his review will not go far enough: "We are concerned that he will only be able to tinker with the system because of the constraints of his remit, whereas we are urging a review of the whole strategy. We do need systems to help keep children safe, but possibly not these ones."